


Immortal

by messygirl8907



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Immortality, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-11
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-20 17:15:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2436596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/messygirl8907/pseuds/messygirl8907
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Immortality comes at a price. Bond's might just be Q.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Requiem for the Deathless](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2432342) by [nagapdragon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagapdragon/pseuds/nagapdragon). 



> Okay, first James Bond story, this plot bunny was bugging me, so I just wrote it down. Comment/Kudos to tell if I should continue! Thanks! No beta, so if you find any mistakes, kindly tell me.

“So you’re just going to sell me away? Your own son?!” His voice carried through the flat as he yelled at her.  
“No, it’s not like that…” He interrupted her.  
“But it is like that! You’re putting Queen and Country above me again! You’re planning on forcing me into slavery.” M cut in quickly.  
“It’s not slavery! You’ll still be your own person; you just won’t be able to do some things. But it’s for the best! I’m doing this for your own good!” The look he sent her was one of pure disbelief.  
“My own good?” His voice softened to a whisper. “How is this for my own good? You’re just doing this for your precious 007.” M sighed and sat down next to her son.  
“I’m not just doing this for him, Quentin. I’m doing this for you as well.” He chuckled sadly, and then leaned into her for what little comfort she could give him.  
“I’ll let you think that. Besides, there’s nothing I can do to change your mind. When will the ritual take place?”  
“Not for a few more years, don’t worry. We’ll do it after you finish college.” The boy sighed, then stood up and left for the comfort of his room. He was being sold away to a man he’d never met, just to keep the man from being able to die.  
The legend went as so. An ink with magical properties was tattooed into the man, and they became immortal. But someone else had to have the same pattern tattooed into their skin, making them an equivalent of the immortal’s slave. Because they became immortal, someone needed to take the pain of them dying, so whenever the immortal died, the slave felt all of the pain. The only comfort of the bond was the knowledge that you would be together until the slave died, basically promising eternal love. Unless you had never met, which was Quentin’s problem at the moment. There was no benefit from this deal for him. And his mother was forcing him to enter into it to keep 007 safe. But he would enjoy his time as a free man, until it was all ripped away from him in a few years.

*

“Are you still going to make me do this?” Quentin asked his mum, his voice shaking.  
“I’m sorry, but it has to be done. Are you going to come willingly?” He nodded, his voice failing him. They walked into MI6 together, Quentin’s head lowered, M’s raised high. They met Bond in her office, Quentin shaking silently. He looked up at the man who was soon to own him, and was met with a cold stare. He felt nauseous. Why did his mum love this man so much? He seemed so cold that even his eyes were frozen over.  
“Okay, we have some paperwork to sign, and then you’ll head down to the tattoo area.” M’s calculating voice cut through the silence. Quentin wanted to cry as he signed his life away to a man he had just met. Bond signed the paper with cold efficiency, nothing showing on his face.  
Quentin spared one pleading look at his mother before he was led away. She carefully avoided his gaze. He wanted to cry again.  
The tattoo area was a cold and cynical place. Bond decided the symbol was to be a gun, bullet cutting through the air. How very predictable of him. Quentin got tattooed last, nerves had been racking up as he sat in the chair. Straps were placed, holding him to the chair. This was bound to hurt.  
A scream was ripped from his throat as the ink touched his flesh. It burned into him, causing him to have to obey whatever Bond told him. When the needle passed through his shoulder for the last time, he went limp. He let the emotions of the day wash over him as he sat and cried. Bond said nothing as he watched Quentin cry. Once his tears had dried Bond spoke.  
“You’ll find your own place to live. Feel free to do whatever you want, I don’t want to see you for a long time.” With that he left, nothing else was said. Quentin began to cry again, his life changing; no one cared about him anymore. He would just have to learn how to live by himself. His head made up, his heart hardened, leaving no room for anyone else.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know close to nothing about coding and computers, so if there are any glaring errors please tell me! Thanks for reading and commenting!

There was no contact between Quentin and his mother after she sold him away. There was also no contact between him and the man who "owned" him. His life was filled with loneliness. But with the way things were going, that didn't seem to matter to him. He was on his own for a year, working his way up Q Branch, slowly rising to the top until he was R. He met Eve Moneypenny during one of his first missions overseeing field agents.

"Turn left here, but please don't go up the fire escape. I know how you agents love doing that.” Eve laughed softly over the comms.

“It is true, we love doing that. How many agents have you overseen?” Quentin typing reached over the comms.

“Only a few now. You’re my fourth. Wait, go back through that door. There are agents coming through the third door on your right, ready to shoot.” She made a sound of disbelief.

“Your fourth mission and you’re this good at it? I refuse to believe it,” she said jokingly. Quentin heard the sound of gunshots coming from the comms. “Okay, where do I go next?” He absolutely did not breathe a sigh of relief at hearing her voice.

“Okay, turn right and you should see a door right in front of you. Go through it and you’re out.” Her voice reached him once again.

“Thank you. What’s your name? I want to be able to request a competent agent the next time I’m on a mission.” Quentin laughed a bit.

“They can’t all be that bad. My name is Quentin. People will know me by that. I don’t have a last name.” She huffed out a laugh.

“Well, Quentin No Last Name, I will be happy to work with you again. Moneypenny out.” Q leaned back in his chair. He sipped out of his scrabble mug and sighed. It was cold again. There was no point in continuing his work unless he had a good hot cup of Earl Gray, so he left towards the break room. His mug was almost filled when he felt the ground shake. He collapsed on the ground and crawled towards the door. There was rubble covering his exit. He couldn’t leave. Quentin sighed. At least he was in there alone. He couldn’t handle people crying right now. He sat down next to the counter and began to catch up on some much needed sleep.

*

Once the emergency team had come and got him out, Quentin was forced to go to M’s temporary office and debrief.

“A bomb was set off and we don’t know who did it or why. But we do know that Major Boothroyd was killed during the blast. You’re R, meaning you are our new Q.” Quentin had to sit down. This promotion was supposed to make the whole slavery worthwhile. All he felt now was dread. He wasn’t ready for this. He was only 23 for goodness sakes.

“Shit. That’s…” He breathed out a heavy sigh. “I guess I’m to report in tomorrow?” M nodded and he quickly left the room. The trip back to his flat was uneventful, and he slowly let himself into his flat. Amelie sidled her way up to his side, purring. He petted her silky fur.

“I can’t believe any of this, Amelie. This wasn’t supposed to happen so quickly. I barely know what I’m doing.” She hopped out of his grasp, heading towards the bedroom. “Good idea. Bedtime for the both of us.”

*

Quentin had a few weeks to get settled into Q Branch, ready to learn his way through it. Most of the techies thought that he was too young to be the head of their branch, treating him with little respect. Hopefully he would change that today. He had talked a few of his hacker friends into hacking MI6, promising no repercussions so he could show them what he could do. They were supposed to start the second he walked into his branch. He took his first step into the basement of MI6.

“What the hell is going on?! Everything was fine a second ago!” Shouts ran out from all around Q Branch. Quentin walked up to his desk calmly. R came up to him.

“Sir, everything’s going haywire! We don’t know what’s going on!” Quentin just took a sip out of his mug then logged on to his computer, enlarging the screen so everyone could see what he was doing. He quickly typed in the code that he needed to get them out of his system. He didn’t know what they were going to do, that having been part of their agreement. He wanted to get them out of his system with his own skills. Everyone in Q Branch had stopped what they were doing to watch him at work. After he had gotten them out of his system, he put on his signature.

“Holy shit, Q’s Ghost!” The whispers went around the branch like wildfire.

“Ghost is the world’s best hacker!” Quentin smirked.

“All right, the crisis is over, everyone get back to work.” He retreated back into his office, when a familiar voice stopped him.


	3. Chapter 3

“You know, when I asked where to find you, I didn’t expect to be directed to Q’s office.” Q breathed a sigh of relief.

“Miss Moneypenny. What a pleasure to see you finally. I would have told you, but it’s been a recent development.” She sighed.

“Yes, I’ve heard all about the bombing. I’m sorry. I was wondering if you’d like to go get spectacularly drunk with me tonight. I kind of need it after that kind of news. I figure you might too.” With that explanation, making sure that it wasn’t a date, he agreed and they set a time.

When Eve came to pick him up for drinks, he was grateful. The day had been difficult, to say the least. 004 didn’t listen to his instructions and ended up in the hospital, and to top it all off, he had to cover one of his best hacker’s work because the man was sick. So he collapsed in the passenger’s seat of the car and sighed.

“Long day?” He nodded enthusiastically.

“I can’t wait to get drunk. I don’t know if I can handle any more of these bloody Double-0s.” Eve laughed.

“Just wait, I hear 007 came back from the dead and is doing his tests to get back into the field.” She felt him tense at the mention of the agent. Trying to clear the waters, she spoke again. “So, should I call you Quentin or Q now?” He chuckled a bit.

“You can call me Quentin when we’re alone. Otherwise call me Q. You’re one of two people who know my real name.”

“Only two? Wow, you really are a mystery man.” He laughed a short, tinkling sound. She decided that she wanted to hear it again sometime. The new Quartermaster didn’t seem one to let most people see the real him.

*

Once they had gotten quite a few drinks in, they started asking questions.

“Why do only two people know your name? That must get really lonely.” Q sighed.

“It does, believe me. But I gave up everything including my name when my mother…” he trailed off.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I know all about secrets.” He smiled at her, thankful.

“I don’t want to keep secrets from you. You seem like someone I could be friends with, were the circumstances different.” She looked confused.

“Why can’t we be friends? I don’t see any reason.” Q sighed.

“I’ll ask for you to be given security clearance. Maybe she’ll let me. She does owe me a favor.” Eve laughed.

“M owes you a favor? Wow, you must be a powerful person indeed!” Q huffed out a bitter laugh.

“Not as much as you might think.”

*

Eve came to find him three days later.

“So, I got a nice fancy email from M saying that my security clearance went up.” Q turned around quickly, brilliant smile lighting up his face.

“Really? Do you want to come over tonight? I can tell you everything.” Eve nodded, and then turned to leave when Q gave a shout of pain. She quickly whipped around to see Q clutching his shoulder in pain.

“Q, are you okay?” He nodded, grimacing.

“I’ll be fine. This is something I can tell you about tonight.” She left the room reluctantly with prodding from Q.

*

Eve arrived at Q’s flat and was impressed by all the security measures. He let her in and got the take-away menus.  
“Okay, order whatever you like, I’ll be right back.” Eve agreed, and he left.

When he got back they started talking.

“Okay, you know how all of the Double-0s never seem to die in the field?” Eve nodded. Everyone noticed that. It was uncanny. “There’s a reason they can’t die.”  
When he was finished telling her about what had happened to him, her mind wandered.

“That’s awful! And Bond just told you that he didn’t want to ever see you again?” Q nodded, his head down. No wonder the boy tensed up when she mentioned him.  
“So now I feel the pain whenever he dies or comes close. I never wanted it to happen. I didn’t even know him.” Eve had a sympathetic look on her face. The things he must have gone through were terrible.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I haven't updated for such a long time! Thanks for the kudos and comments! Please continue to comment, it does make me update faster. :)

Q checked his email the first thing when he got into work. He froze when he read the email from M. He couldn’t go outfit Bond for a mission! He wasn’t ready to see him again. Well, if he had to do it, it would be on his turf. He sent a reply with the location.  
Bond sat in front of the painting waiting for Q to show up. Who chose a museum for a meet up anyways? A kid in a parka came and sat next to him. He didn’t have time for this, damn it.  
“Excuse me,” he said as he stood up.  
“007. I’m your new Quartermaster.” Bond almost laughed in the kid’s face.  
“You must be joking.” The kid looked like he would blow over with a hard wind. Bond took a closer look. He looked remarkably familiar. As if Bond knew him from somewhere important. He was broken out of his thought process, and spoke again. “Hard to know which in your pajamas.” He paused. “Q.” Q smiled at him minutely. Bond was hit with a pang of arousal in his gut.  
“007.” A gun and radio were handed to him. The boy left without another word. Bond still had the feeling that he should know who the boy was. He seemed important.

*

As soon as Q left the meeting, he fumbled for his phone and called Eve.  
“Hello?” Her voice projected from the phone.  
“He didn’t even recognize me. We met and he didn’t recognize me.” His voice was shaky as he stumbled into the MI6 issued car. Her concerned voice reassured him.  
“Isn’t that a good thing? You can get to know him without having all of the pressure of before on you.” Q breathed out heavily. The car was driving back to the temporary MI6 headquarters, and he felt safer the closer they got.  
“I guess so. I’m sure he’s really not a bad person. We did meet during a bad situation. Thank you, Eve. I need to go, we just pulled into MI6.”

*

They had caught Silva by the time he had to interact with Bond again. Q was feeling much better about the whole situation by the time Bond wandered into his office.  
When Q told him that he had invented the safeguards on Silva’s computer, he could tell that the man was impressed. He didn’t show it on his face, but when they were together, or Bond’s emotions were strong enough, he could feel them. Riding on the high of his ego boost, he got cocky and plugged the computer into the MI6 servers without thinking. It was his fault the Silva escaped.  
“Shit.” Q grabbed for the cords and ripped them out of the computer. He took the computer and hacked back on to his system in a matter of minutes.  
“Bond, are you there?” The agent responded in an affirmative. “I’ll lead you where you need to go.”  
Q lost himself talking to the agent. It was refreshing having someone to talk to who would snark back at him for once. It had nothing to do with the fact that it was Bond. Nothing at all. By the time he had cut off the connection, Q had a smile on his face. He shook himself. Nothing could come of this; it wasn’t his fault that Bond hated him. Q dove back into his work, determined to forget the conversation.

*

“There goes my promising career in espionage.” Bond cut off the line before Q could hear him laugh. There was no need for the boy’s ego to get any bigger. M stared at him.  
“I’ve never heard you laugh like that. Who are you talking to?” Bond shut down the childish urge to glare at her.  
“No one, it’s just Q. He’s going to help us.” M looked down at her clasped hands before sighing. Bond didn’t ask what that was about, even though he wondered. M didn’t want to talk about it, that much was obvious. But what had her so rattled? M sighed again as he pulled over.  
“I’m not sleeping here.” Bond chuckled as he opened the door.  
“Relax, we’re changing cars. This one’s not traceable.” M grumbled as they got into the car, and Bond wondered what he was even going to do. Silva was going to find them eventually, and then everything would go to hell. He just had to wait.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry I haven't been updating lately, I've been busy with school and such, really I'm supposed to be revising a paper right now, but I'm writing this instead...

Q was in the middle of Q-Branch, guiding 005 through a mission when a wave of sadness hit him. It was so sudden and immense that he collapsed into his chair.  
“Q! Are you okay?” Tears were streaming down his face. There was only one explanation. M was dead, and Bond’s emotions were transferring over to him. He started crying harder. His mother was dead. His only living relative, gone. He motioned for R to come closer.  
“I need you to take over. I will be in my office if you need me.” He handed the coms over, and stumbled over to his office, activating the privacy glass. Once the glass went dark he collapsed on the floor, letting go.

*

When Bond got back into England, carrying M’s dead body in his car, he stopped in Q-Branch. R was on the coms, with Q nowhere to be found. He sauntered up to R.  
“Where’s Q?” R looked at him, pleadingly.  
“He went into his office a few days ago, crying, and he never came out. No one knows the codes to get in, and no one is strong enough to get into the office by force. I don’t even know why he started crying in the first place.”  
That was weird. There was no reason for Q to go into his office, especially not crying. Unless… Bond went over to Q’s office and knocked.  
“Q? Are you in there?” He heard stumbling around.  
“Go away, 007. There’s no need for you to come in here. I’m fine. Just leave your equipment with R.” The boy’s voice was shaky, and sounded rough like he had been crying too much.  
“Q, I’m not just going to leave you in there. We need to talk. Let me in before I break down the door and we have this conversation in front of the entire Q-Branch.” He heard a few more noises before the hiss of the electronic door. Bond slowly walked into the darkness of Q’s office. He paused to let his eyes adjust to the dark, and he glanced around the office to see Q on the floor amidst a bunch of paperwork. The boy’s eyes were glazed over and red. Bond slowly crouched next to him.  
“I didn’t even remember did I. And I treated you so horribly the first time. I don’t understand how you don’t hate me completely. I basically killed any chances you had for a regular life.” Q snorted.  
“My mother did that, not you.” Bond thought about that for a second.  
“Wait, your mother was M?” Q nodded weakly. Bond had the sudden urge to wrap his arms around the younger man, protectively. He looked so small, trembling on the ground.  
“She sold me away, and I didn’t talk to her again. And now she’s dead. Why did I have to be so stubborn?” He started to cry again. A single tear slid down his cheek as Bond picked him up.  
“Come on, I’m taking you home. There’s no need to stay here and suffer. It’s not your fault, little one. She was the one who did that to you. And then I made it so much worse by doing that to you. I’m so sorry.” He draped his suit jacket over him and carried him out of Q-Branch. Time to go home.

*

Q woke in an unfamiliar place. There were blankets covering him, and a glass of steaming Earl Grey next to the bed.  
“Hello?” Bond walked through the open door.  
“You’re awake. Do you remember anything from yesterday? You have been sleeping for a while.” As soon as he said that, memories flooded back. Q groaned.  
“You carried me out of my branch.” Bond chuckled. “Don’t worry, no one will think any less of you.” Q grabbed hold of the tea and chugged it down.  
“I’m going to need more caffeine if I’m to deal with this. Please tell me I don’t have work today.”  
“No, I got you a week of leave for bereavement. You won’t have to go in until you’re ready.” As Q got out of the mass of blankets, he spoke.  
“We’re going to have to talk about this whole, immortality thing, aren’t we?” Bond nodded. I didn’t even know who you were until yesterday. As well as the fact that I was an ass to you.” Q nodded.  
“How about we postpone that conversation for a while. I doubt I’m ready to deal with that.” Bond nodded again as he set the tea on to boil.  
“We’ll wait until you’re ready. This is your decision.” Q snorted.  
“Those are words I haven’t heard in a while. It’s nice.”


End file.
